As many may know from the previous post AGEOD has reissued their American Civil War strategic game. So I thought I would start a walk through with the game to see what changed, what's the same, and if I can still remember such things.

To get things started I divided into the full two theatre war scenario starting in April 1861. Things are going to go slow with a lot of posts per turn as I comment on things as I try them.

The most obvious change when you start up the game is that all the graphics have been redone. The game now looks more like a traditional strategic board game than a game of Stratego. Unit icons and pictures have been much improved. Also things look busier, like there is a lot of new things out on that map yet to be discovered.

And, once you start looking for something to click on you discover the other big change. The interface has been totally redone so you have to relearn how to do most things.

In the top left is a small graphic with three bubbles that give you access to most game functions. The background of the graphic when clicked will take you to your capital, in case you lost it. The first bubble, also F11 key, opens the Military Recruitment Mode, the second bubble, F12 key, opens the Decision Mode, and the last bubble opens the Strategic Atlas which give you access to the various functions you need to control your country.

To the right of this graphic are a line of status type displays showing your Victory Points, Money, Conscripts, War Supplies, Rail Points, River Points, and Foreign Entry odds. Some of these will display additional detail when you hold the mouse over them.

And, when you execute a turn, you will see some boxes and icons in the lower right that give you access to the Messages from the turn. The icons correspond to event that occurred and clicking on them will take you to where they occurred. The boxes will contain numbers showing how many messages of each type occurred. Clicking on them will open the Message display box (its no longer permanently on the screen) which will display them. The boxes are Scripted, Battle, Movements, Unit, Control and Other. It looks like they tried to give better organization to the game messages which use to be one large text script.

As the Confederate side there isn't much to do on the first turn since the only force you can move is in SC and is used to attack Fort Sumter. However, even with this a lot of small and large changes showed up.

First is the actual attack showed some interesting changes. I as before selected the force called the "Carolina Dept" and dragged them over to the Ft. Sumter area. In the old game that force could make that move in a single turn (2 weeks) but this time it showed the move would take 19 days. This means they will not capture the fort until the end of April. However when the game turn is executed it generates an automatic event "Fort Sumter bombarded" which triggers the war starting and "Virginia Succeeds" event. It also triggered another automatic event called "Fortifications started in Capital" along with a warning message that you don't need to build your own fortifications for a few turns because they are automatic now.

This is a trend I will be watching for. It looks like more events in the game are scripted rather than under player control.

A Major change has been made with how units are constructed. I will follow up on this as I get more familiar with how they are doing it. But it appears to be a two step process now giving you more control but extra work. Before when units were built they automatically were assigned to some city in the Region you selected the unit from. Now it appears you select the area as well.

In this first turn there were already four units available for construction. These were displayed when you click on the "Military Recruitment Mode" balloon at the top, or F11. Then across the bottom the units ready for construction are shown. In this case one SC regular, two SC militia, one 6 pd artillery, and a SC gun boat. When you passed the cursor over these unit types the map displayed in green areas you could place the unit in which were mostly S. C. regions. You could then select a unit and drop it on the region you wanted it built in. At that time it would subtract the cost in men, money, and resources to build the unit from your total. The unit will now show up on the map but locked while it built for whatever the number of turns required were. For the militia it was two weeks. For the regulars it was 30 days.

The other interesting things was if the unit required special resources like iron works for the artillery you would find no green regions do drop it in. This could be a major change that will force players to upgrade their infrastructure in order to build units like artillery, cavalry and boats. At least for the South.

I don't know how I feel about this change. It might be excessive micro management but that might be a side effect of forcing the South to build infrastructure. I never did in the old game.

One thing I saw that I had hoped they had done away with is that one of their units still used the strange element combinations the old game used. It had two infantry elements and one cavalry. I hope this is an exception and they are not still using units with mixed forces (artillery and cavalry elements in them). Why they did it in the old game I will never know and why they would carry it over into the new game defies reason. I hope they are just representing one of the early formations that did do this but I suspect not.

The other operation I performed this turn was getting some money. The method of getting to the selection screen has changed but the basic operation is the same. You click on the "Strategic Atlas" button (haven't found a short cut key yet) and it opens a tabbed index card like display. You pick the "Government" tab and it shows the money related options like "Issue War Bonds", "Raise Exceptional Taxes" and "Print Paper Money". The big change here is in the old game clicking on these would step through all the optional choices you had for each. For example, War Bonds could be issued at three levels and Taxes had at least two levels. These choices have disappeared. I selected War Bonds and got 400,000. War Bonds can be issued twice a year and I did it now in case the twice is locked to first and second half of the year like in the old game.

Thanks for the in-depth analysis! I will give this game a thorough look over as I am wanting to get a strategic game to complement my current collection of tactical games. Many times, the actions taken before a battle took place was what determined who would have a good shot at a victory.

I realized that I had raised money but hadn't raised any troops. I started looking for the Call for Volunteers option and didn't find. I had thought I had seen it but apparently must have only seen in in the manual. Apparently they took the option away and made it a scripted even since when I executed this turn I found the units available expanded considerably.

Pet Peeve - I had started the game a number of times so had to many instances showing up for selection when I clicked the "Load" button. Since they use the scenario name over and over the only way to tell one game from another is by their date stamp and maybe their counter (is it 1/4 or 3/4?). At this time I realized they had no delete so there is no way to clean up your Save folder from the game. Normally this wouldn't be a problem. All you do is open Windows Explorer, find the Save folder and manually delete them. Except "where the H*** is the Save folder. Finally traced it to the following path:C:\User\<your user name here>\Documents\My Games\Civil War II\CW2\SavesNote to programmers of games - if you are going stick save files 7 or 8 layers down include a file management screen in your game.

Back into the game I see I have lots of money but no recruits. Doesn't matter I have nothing I can build but a gun boats which I don't want. I check the Production screen and it now shows the line unit I requested. It also has a red number on the Replacement Pool for Line Infantry saying I have line infantry hits of 150 which have nothing to cover them. So I click on the Line Unit symbol three times to request 3 to be built which costs me 20K, 10 conscripts and 2 Tons of war supplies each. Don't yet know how "hits" correspond to units of. That is, 3 units of Line replacements will handle how many hits?

In the Diplomacy window I decide to strike back at the Union for declaring a blockade and lowering my chance of Foreign Intervention some 13 points. I declare a Cotton Embargo which will cost me -$150K, -3 MP, -5 VP. Interesting thing the "-$150K" turned out to give me 150,000. Have to see how the others work.

Not much else to do this turn. It does bother me that the Carolina Dept force has no button for attacking. What will happen when they reach Ft. Sumter?

Observation: They did change how they refer to a unit now. Many are labeled as brigades with elements that look more like regiments. For example, Bartow's Brigade which is part of the Ft. Sumter attack forces now contains the combined 8th&9th Ga, 7th Ga, 1st Ga Cav, and Wise Artillery(6 pders). This makes it look better than having a generic unit containing two infantry, one cavalry and one artillery element.

Side comment for Joe - I consider AGEOD's game the best Strategic game of the Civil War to come out. However, it achieves this by including a lot of detail the others don't which gives it quite a learning curve. But it is the only one that really worked logistics into the game so well that the player can use tactics like Forest's raids to stop an army.

Now to see what little happened when I pushed the execute turn button on Turn 2.

Number of events occurred.US abandoned Harper's Ferry - really appreciate that.I got 15 points for Cotton embargo bringing up my chance of Foreign Intervention to a pitiful 1%.Arkansas and Tennessee Succeeded. But North Carolina hasn't leaving Virginia still cut off.Josiah Grogas opened a Steel Mill in Richmond but I still can't make a cannon.The CSA mobilized their two principle armies. J. Johnson in Warren, Va, and Beauregard in Manassas. Both are locked though as they build up.My blockade runners brought in 2 War Supplies.

Turn 3 Prep

I gave Bushrod command of the Suffolk Militia and sent him marching to Norfolk to see what happens. Finally discovered how to change the units stance to attack. When a force is selected the detail screen showing its members has two icons on the left side of it. The top one defaults to defense but if you click on it a pop out to its left shows all the various modes selectable. One is Assault. Once you pick on the lower icon changes to correspond to it and you can select it to get other options that modify the order.

Likewise, I gave Winder at Winchester a Militia unit and sent him to Harpers Ferry to see if I could secure it a little better. Since HF is friendly I could use rail to get them there in one day.

Down at Ft. Sumter now knowing how to make an assault order I give them the order to take the place. And, I sent the few S.C. units I built west to Nashville since they didn't get much.

Richmond received two ship groups, a two frigate one and a two brig one, so I am going to try to run them past Ft. Monroe to Ft. Clark.

Production:I am now showing 6 Line Inf reserves but the hits jumped to 552 probably due to all those depleted units in the two new armies. I put some more points in to Line and the new Elite type.

Military Recruitment:Have lots of units this time but no capacity. The units have a state designation like Va or SC which tells you the general area you can build them in. If you don't have the resources they will be in read. I selected a MS brigade to be built at Jackson.

The icons they use to represent units has changed considerably. Gone are the funny looking pieces they used that looked like pawns. The icon now looks much more like the traditional board game square chit. The left side is a graphic showing the soldier or leader. For a combat unit it has the power rating number below this. The right side is full of bar graphs showing various parameters, try to go into more detail later. And on the bottom right the old envelope telling whether the have initiative or not (white/brown).

There is a base that forms like the chit is being held vertical in a stand. I think the base graphic indicates the degree of entrenchment but haven't verified this.

Battle of Harper's FerryWasn't much of a battle. Gen. Hamilton showed up with a brigade of regulars with a small cavalry attached. Winder and his militia were roughly handled and sent packing back to Winchester even though the battle outcome was Stalemate.

Somehow a brigade with a half dozen generals (AI has some problems) marched past my locked forces at Manassas and occupied Culpeper. Don't know what effect this will have. It is one of the flaws that sometimes shows up in these scenarios where the designer tries to limit things but leaves some loose cannons around.

I take Fort Sumter and occupy it.

My ships in Richmond make it out to the coast.Event during execution:North Carolina secedes - Virginia now linked to rest of south.Union pulls out of Norfolk - and my militia moves in but this would have happened regardless. Just give me a little better occupation force.Capital move to Richmond.Hasty defenses are erected around Richmond - but I don't know whether my locked forces inside will fight if attacked.Future Army of the West is assembling in Little Rock - it says I need to send them a three star General.

Turn 4 Late May - Planning

I have almost nothing that can move to react with. I send Gen. Whiting with the 1st Res Brigade to Culpeper but not sure he is strong enough to do anything.

Production wise it still shows I need Replacements in a number of categories so I spend all my Recruits on replacements.

I would added some examples of graphics but I don't know how to do that on this Forum. Anyone know if their is a way to include an image on the Forum?

Afraid of that. For now will use one of my web sites but it means the graphics may go away at some point.

Turn 4 Execution

Battle of CulpeperWhiting and his little brigade from Richmond struck Gen. Keyes. Numbers in my favor 1801 to 1201 and victory was ours sending Keyes packing but not far. Now he is over threatening Fredericksburg.

The new game has a new feature that allows you at the start of these battles to set your tactical plan. The default is balanced line. It only works in single player and apparently whatever I picked for a scenario isn't single event though the AI is playing the other side. It's more like the tactical card games. You pick attack on left they pick defend on right, you will now have better chance of win. I will have to look into this further sometime. If it only works against the AI it is of limited value though. AI has enough trouble.

Events that occurred:St. Louis massacre - why not.Sam Houston's fight against secession - throws in chance to again some prestige (whatever that is) if you take Dallas back in 5 months. I'll send some troops up but no big effort.Union is marching around with weak units in W.Va.A number of brigades are auto raised around the south. None are moveable yet but it seems to reflect their new approach to the opening of the war.

Interesting observation but probably no real change because of difficulty operating out there. They have extended the map to the Rocky Mountains. Gone are the near by off map regions like New Mexico area, etc. But these are very difficult areas to operate in.

Turn 5 - Early June

Still few troops to react with. Most are still locked.Sent a Va unit from Richmond to James City so they just can't walk down the Peninsula.Sent a SC unit to Va just in case nothing much releases again.Sent Price's miserable little force to Springfield.Sent a quick reaction (mostly cavalry) force to Henderson by RR and Gen. W. Smith redeployed there to meet them. Then they will go to Dallas.

Redeployment has changed. The old game had it and allowed one unit to jump to anywhere on map per turn instantly and immediately join forces there. Change is there is a delay. The redeployed unit will show up after turn execution. Old game would have allowed me to redeploy Smith to Houston, immediately combine him with the Tx force and send the whole group to Dallas. Now I had to send each separately toe Henderson so they could combine next turn for their attack on Dallas.

Production:Everyone is in the black in the replacement pool but I still allocate two to infantry. But this will leave me some recruits for new units for a change.

Industry:For the first time choices came up on this one. This tab allows you to build infrastructure so your War Supply production will increase. It is a long term investment item. They are giving seven choices mostly for Iron Works, Armories and Arsenals in different regions of the South. The old game had these but implemented in a more confusing way. They also were very cost ineffective because they created a turn per turn drain on production and never seemed to ever increase anything. Some players used them and said later in 1863-4 they created more supply. I found they mostly weakened the South so much in the early years there weren't any later years. These look better designed so we will see.

I selected Armories in Va & SC. The actual action specifies what locations which in this case were 2 in Richmond and 3 in Charleston. This is important to watch for because you don't want to invest in building something in cities you aren't going to be able to hold. Especially since it cost $175,000 and 40 Tons of War Supplies. But at least now its a one time cost.

Military Recruitment:This time the choices multiplied. There are 110 to select from. Luckily there is a filter that allows you to select a region so the list is shorter but it still requires a lot of scrolling.I build an Inf Brigade in Richmond, New Orleans and Nashville to make sure they would have something in 30 days or so.

Now for a graphic example:

This hopefully shows the map's leader icon.They now have a nice portrait of the leader on the left against a gray (or blue) background. On the right they have the CSA flag at the top. Below it three bars showing status. Unfortunately, their manual doesn't explain what they are. This is something you will find about the game. The manual gives you the basics of how but little else. Everything else comes from their Forum community without the game is almost a black box. The three bars, red, blue and green I think, probably represent cohesion, strength and supply. But maybe not.

Also shown as a number below the portrait is the unit's Power Rating. This is a number that is suppose to reflect the units overall combat power all things considered like manpower, quality, weapons, etc.

Below the bars are a little envelope which is brown. If white this unit would have offensive capabilities.

And at the bottom right is the Generals rank which is one star.

At the top left there is a little blue flag like extension with a "- )" symbol. This is one of about eight symbols indicating its stance. This one is the "Default Defensive" posture.

Overall though the Map icon is much nicer and more informative than the old games.

You will notice the number of things that have to be done and the lack of any idea of what the long term effects of your choices are, are increasing each turn. It will get a lot worse as troops are released and other type actions are possible. That is why this is one of the more complex games on the Civil War.

Kennon, you referred earlier to "hits" being taken in the creation of units. Could you explain and elaborate on that a little more?

I will give it a try. Displaying this "hit" number is new. Before you didn't find out you hadn't built enough replacement "units" until you saw their number drop to zero. The "hits" represent the amount of demand for replacements that are out there in the virtual world. But I don't know what the quantitative value of a "hit" is. That is, just how many "replacement units" you need to provide men to fill out those "hits". We will probably have to wait until we get some developer articles over on the AGEOC forums to learn this. But I can clarify what they represent to some degree.

In the game whenever a unit takes casualties due to combat, starvation, etc. it's strength drops below its full strength value. This will show up as a text description on the unit saying something like its strength is 46 of 83. The little color bar, green on unit, will show the percentage its at. My bet is that if we take 83 and subtract 46 we will be looking at the hit number of 37 but I don't know that.

When new units go into construction or appear due to an event like Beauregard's Army Of the Potomac, they will come on all reduced and locked. These create an immediate demand for replacements which is why I saw the hit demand jump suddenly into the 500 plus range.

Now to complicate things this hit number doesn't represent how much is going to be used but rather the total demand out there for replacements from infantry, cavalry, artillery, etc. (there is a separate number of each). The actual number drawn from the pool depends on the units situation and how fast they can rebuild.

In the old game they showed you the number of units on the map for each type of replacement and the rule of thumb was keep about 10% of that number in replacement pool. The "hit" number seems to have replaced this more general number but in the manual they still recommend the 10% of the number of units.

Bottom line is that allocations to the Replacement pool are a gut feeling thing that requires experience with the game. Thing I have learned from the old game is that some unit types seldom draw much so having 1 or 2 points in their pool is sufficient. You just wait for them to go to zero then add one. Others like Militia seem to be automatically filled so you never purchase one. The artillery doesn't seem to use them very rapidly so keeping 2-5 in them is sufficient especially for heavy guns. Its the Infantry, Elites and Cavalry you have to keep a eye on them checking every turn. Whenever I am expecting a large battle to occur I usually pre-prepare by allocating up to 10 extra to Line Infantry so that there won't be a bottleneck in the recovery of that army after the fight.

Move and combat wise its a quiet turn. I did find out why I wasn't seeing the pre-battle planning state that was in the rules. The default optional settings has it disabled. I turned it on but I don't know whether it will apply to this game.

Finally J. Johnston and Beauregard's armies are unlocked. Unfortunately, a lot of artillery did not build up to full strength. I will have to try to figure out why.

Turn 5 Late June - Preparation

ProductionPut some more points into various replacement pools to get them built up.Only a few recruits left so started a few minor builds with them.

PlanningSent Joe and the Shenandoah Force to take Harpers Ferry. Gave him an assault order but had to leave two of his batteries behind because they were so weak. This really doesn't have much effect since Joe isn't rated to command so many units anyway. The defending force is much weaker but the Union could send troops to reinforce them. If they have rail they will get there first.Also sent Whiting and his Reserve Bde to drive of Keyes. Whiting doesn't have initiative so he marches off with just a defensive order. Many times you will find this works. Sending a unit on defense into enemy controlled region. Other side may attack them.I moved some heavy guns from Norfolk to Richmond so they won't get captured later.G. Smith met up with the Texas forces and now I send the combined group toward Dallas to retake it. Unfortunately it says it will take 19 days.

Turn 6 Late June - Execution

Nothing happens. The Harpers Ferry Yankees retreat without a fight.

EventsLincoln calls for volunteers, 75,000. Hope I get to too.CSS Ironclads are started: Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee.Event saying we can increase our rail and river pool (before you could put money and war supplies into this every turn, now it looks like you must have an event first)Congress authorizes pay for volunteers - hope this gets me some men.Island 10 is bombarded with 15 hits and 0 against the enemy - this is a change. In the old game attacks against fortifications were broken. If you sent a fleet against Island 10 the outcome would probably be your fleet was sunk. I'll have to watch this one and see how it works. It was a bug in the old game that resulted from some other changes they had to make to fix something else.

Graphic Example this time is an image showing the area around Winchester and Harpers Ferry and the move of Joe's army.

Generally they did a nicer job of the terrain. Before it looked a little cartoonish. Also notice the base around the bottom of the picture icons. These represent the amount of entrenchment that has occurred. The Union force at Harpers Ferry hasn't been there long so just has a level 1 fortification which is a funky looking earth work. Joe has been at it a little longer plus has artillery so his has some improvements.

You can also see the gray lines showing where Joe's move will be made. Because Joe is actually in Strasburg he moves by a round about way using the roads into Morgan, WVa.

Note the power numbers below the pictures. Joe has 549 and the Union forces is only 55 so it should be an easy victory unless they get reinforced.

It is difficult to see the city symbols behind the Units but you can see Leesburg. Usually there is one key city in each region which will have a flag showing ownership and some building icons which will indicate how developed it is. The name also has a number showing the cities size I think. To the left of Strasburg you will also see an additional number "2" which is the number of groups inside the city.The black box in the lower right is a pop up that occurs for any region you have the cursor in giving basic information about its state.

KenWhat are options for building higher echelons, divisions corps armies etc?In other words could you over time possibly build a historic army of Tennessee or Northern Virginia?What are elites?John

These options are opened up during 1862 with events. First will be the option to build divisions which in the old game was around January/February. The Corps and Army options occur shortly after. Armies in the old game were limited by the availability of Army HQ units which had to be first built. A Corps required only the availability of a 2/3 star general. For the Union the old game forced the player to take a pretty bad Morale and VP hit if they didn't appoint the highest ranked three star general. You can guess at who those would be.

The game also enforces organization through the number of command points each officer has which is about 18 with some other variables affecting. The various sub units counted against this total. Also to get the full 18 you needed to be in a division organization. That is why Joe Johnston with only four combat units couldn't fully command his force that moved on Harpers Ferry. When the commander doesn't have sufficient point those extra units don't fight except as replacements when others are defeated. A Corps is usually a group of divisions, I forget how many can be controlled through a single Corps commander. It is usually attached to an Army but can operate out of range of Army HQ. The ideal formation is an Army with at least two Corps. Then they can spread out over multiple adjacent regions and if attacked the Corps will come to each others aid.

As I get them I will try to get a better explanation together. Managing ones Armies both organizationally and logistically is a major part of the game. There are numerous support units that you can build that act on the Army level like Staff, Aide de Camp, Medical, Scouts, Spies.

Production - finally discovered why my artillery wasn't building to full strength, no replacements. They have two CSA icons at the top of the screen for selecting replacements. I hadn't realized one displays the artillery replacement icons. Found them at zero and in the red so spent all my money on replacements for Field Artillery and Heavy guns.

Various - This page tab showed some of the infrastructure build options like Rail, River investment. Also had Premium bounties for volunteers. I am still a little concerned I haven't seen a call for volunteers for the South. I know the Union has made one. Hoping I haven't just missed the screen for doing it.

Wish I could do Rail but at 75K and 50 Tons of War Supplies I can't afford it. You can bet the Union can.

Situation:Things got complicated. The main Union army, AoP, marched straight down almost to Richmond. It is now in Hanover with a Power rating of 1101. This opens the door for both opportunity and disaster. The AoP is powerful enough to take Richmond if it has the initiative to do it. But it is also cut off from any supply source so must be carrying everything it needs in wagons. It is hard to predict why the AI decided on this move and/or whether it was scripted. I haven't seen it do this in full games but in some of the sort ones the victory conditions sometimes drive it to head straight for the objective.

My counter:Beauregard moves with his army from Manassas by rail to Richmond which will get him there in five days. This is when having large enough rail to move an army is critical. Joe takes his little force at Harpers Ferry and marches on Alexandria to cut the Union off from Washington.Both leave small units to hold the cities.Whiting's small force destroys the RR in Stafford to further cut supply routes.Huger in Petersburg move to Richmond to help hold the city.

Else where Floyd moves his W.Va. force to take Parkersburg, W.Va. This and the Harpers Ferry occupation are intended to make the shortest East West rail line for the Union unusable.

Turn 7 - ExecutionHad to find out what would happen.Day 1 - Battle of Falmouth - CSA DefeatKeyes 2nd Division with 4612 men defeats Whiting's 1801.(In the game they call Keyes force a Division but it is not a true division like what will be available later. It just is named "2nd Division")Day 2 - Battle of Parkesburg - CSA VictoryFloyd with 4936 men attacks the militia (450 men) holding the town.Day 3 - 2nd Battle of Parkesburg - CSA VictoryThere was a battery inside Parkesburg which is captured.Day 9 - Battle of Springfield The west not to be ignored has a fight. Lyon's with 2806 men, 636 cavalry and 12 guns attacks Price's small force of 1351 at Springfield capturing the town.

And down in Texas my little force under G. Smith capture Dallas without a fight. The Union force slips away to capture Fort Worth.

And what about the Union AoP?Instead of going for Washington it crossed the James River and is now east of Petersburg. Not sure what they are up to. Norfolk? or retreat to Ft. Monroe?

Side DiscussionI thought I would give a bit more detail on what constitutes a Force at this stage of the game. Divisions aren't allowed yet and no true armies exists except as names. My example will be Joe Johnston's Shenandoah force. A Force is always independent, that is, has no higher authority. Because of this it has no Bonuses and actually is reduce in effectiveness. In our case the force has a commander, Joe Johnston, who being a three star general has 12 command points. But being independent is reduce to 6. His force:

This force contains 7 units (counting Joe), which is way more than Joe's six CP can handle.Now look in more detail at the Stonewall brigade. The little markings along the Unit's icon on the upper left indicate the amount of experience this unit has. The three icons to the left of Jackson's picture indicate special attributes of this brigade. They are Surprise (20% chance of first fire in combat rounds), Irregular Fighter (15% bonus to combat, and Strong Morale (5% cohesion bonus). The overall power of the unit is 310.

Clicking on the Unit gives a pop up screen with additional detail:

Here we have a list of what elements make up the Unit. First is the leader, Stonewall Jackson, followed by the names of the five regiments in the brigade. If we click on one of these elements we will get the Element details screen:

Here we will be able to access more detail than we ever wanted to know.

Beauregard marches from Richmond to strike at McDowell and his AoP. McDowell is far from his supports so he has to head for a port. My guess is Norfolk but I think Suffolk is also a port. This move demonstrates a number of things. First I send Beau by Rail making it possible to reach McDowell in Surry, Va in nine days. I also drop his stack directly on McDowell's force which causes the game to consider my target McDowell rather than the region of Surry. I also shift some units around while in Richmond to maximize Beau's strength while improving has command percent which is now up to 28%. This is the number of CP of McDowell divided by the number of CP required for 100% control of force.

I also attempted to send Joe to strike Keyes in Fairfax. My moves of Joe demonstrate some of the easy to have errors you can make. Last turn I sent Joe to beige Alexandria and sent the Winchester force to take over occupying Harpers Ferry. Unfortunately, I must have dropped the Winchester force on Joe instead of HF resulting in Winder ending up in Alexandria. Then this turn I some how messed up the move of Joe to attack Keyes probably due to trying to separate Winder from Joe and send him back to HF. Anyway Joe just sits.

I needed money bad so I Raised Taxes.

Turn 8 Execution

Day 9 Beauregard reaches Surry and the first attempt at battle occurs. The Union decides things aren't in their favor and wants to withdraw. This leads to a four day pursuit as Beau fails to engage each day. On day 13 Beau finally engages in Suffolk, this is when targeting the enemy force is important - Beau followed him to a new region. The Battle of Suffolk is given at the end of the post.

EventsWe can now issue War Bonds - after I raised taxes. I get my first HQ unit to build so soon I will have a real Army.Somehow Ruggles got congratulated for the Battle of Suffolk.Price got chased off.

Now to take a detail look at the Battle:

Because the Union kept succeeding in retreating from combat I got the "Battle Screen" about eight times but this is the first one:

This is a new feature of the game but only works when playing the AI. Across the top you get a summary of the two forces. Below you get some icons that allow you to select your overall tactical plan. Depending on how good you Force's recon ability is you may know something about the enemy's choices shown on the right side. It looks like they plan some kind of withdrawal so I choose Infantry Charge. this didn't catch them but about 6-7 tries later when I chose a balanced attack we finally engaged resulting in the following Stalemate report:

The combat report is very complex with many icons representing a whole range of things that happened during the combat. Actual combat occurs in round which may be very few or 20-30. This summarizes the results and what happen in those rounds. At the top by each Generals portrait it gives a summary of the Force and what effected it. In the game passing the cursor over those little icons pops up a summary of how each affected the combat. Overall force size and casualties are shown. Below the Generals each brigade/unit is displayed and damage to them as well as event affecting them.

The result of the battle was that the Union army retreated back into Surry. This gives the situation pictured below:

As you can see the AoP is getting itself into a spot. It better find a way home before it gets trapped. This time Beau is very close which means next battle will start early and will be difficult to avoid. Also look at the Power ratings of the two forces. While both were reduced the AoP took quite a fatigue hit from all those retreats. We are now 884 vs 507. If they have any supply problems things will be even worse. Plus I have fresh troops near by in Petersburg and Richmond to call on.

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